rs2

Hi all,

We want to fly from Melb to New York sometime in Sept returning one month later using Krisflyer points. Ideally the most direct route & business class or prem economy (we are travelling with an infant). Any airline which fits this bill as closely as possible.

I have spoken with Singapore Airlines and they have basically said there is no availability throughout Sept/Oct with Singapore Airlines, UA, or AirNZ. However, they were not very helpful in suggesting alternative routes/airlines for checking.

So my questions:
* How do I check availability of 'award point' flights on *A partners? (eg. AirNZ or Virgin?)
* Can anyone suggest any other airlines /routes that might be suitable?

Many thanks in advance.

caimaster

How many KF points do you have? There are space from MEL-SIN-ICN/HKG-SFO in business, you can then elect to buy your own ticket from SFO to JFK or redeem miles. There are only econ seats available from SFO - JFK. Or you can do Virgin from MEL-SYD-LAX in business and LAX-JFK in econ. It will be cheaper for you to redeem 2 separate award for business MEL-SIN-ICN/HKG-SFO and then a econ award for SFO-JFK.

You can check *A on United.com no membership require. You can check Virgin Australia on their site, select "use point + pay" and for business award look for "business reward".

CLEguy

Welcome to FT! Virgin Australia partner availability can also be checked on the Delta site.

Osmo

Im a newb at this but I would suggest transferring your KK points to VA points and fly VA or Delta on reward seats. VA doesn't fly to LAX direct from Melb anymore but does via Sydney or Brisbane.

rs2

Thank you all so much for replying and for your suggestions. We have almost 1.5M miles so I think that should be enough for 2 x adults and 1 x infant (actually he will be 18 months by then) who we are thinking of taking on an infant ticket.

I like the sound of the Virgin business class as it is more direct. Do you have any airline recommendations or other re taking our 18 month old? Is taking him on our lap ridiculous?

thanks again.

Osmo

If you do take VA, ask for row 5 as they are semi private as they have a curtain to create a little mini cabin just for you. The middle 3 would work well with you guys, take a old sheet so you can put it on the floor for LO to play on and throw the sheet away before touchdown.

My other advise is to allow for enough time to transit from Syd/Bris domestic to international. We going via Brisbane ourselves soon.

lokijuh

If you can get yourself to Sydney, there are also options of Air Canada (although availability poor I assume) using KF miles, Delta using KF miles transferred to Velocity.

caimaster

1.5M, then you might consider paying for standard award with SQ and fly directly into JFK in business. That would cost you 612,000 miles. If you take Virgin you are looking at close to 500K after the conversion plus another 50K+ for LAX-JFK. When you land in LAX you would have to clear custom then walk over to the US domestic terminal. With SQ you are on the same plane from SIN-JFK with a short stop in FRK. And with that much miles, you might be able to downgrade to saver if that opens up closer to departure. Checking recent availability, that chance is pretty high.

rs2

thanks caimaster and everyone else again. This forum is so helpful - working out FF is a whole other world. We decided to take VA business and got the exact dates we wanted. We'll actually be flying to Washington DC from LAX so yet to work out those flights but hoping it won't be too difficult.

One question: we purchased an infant ticket for our son but now I'm having 2nd thoughts about flying that far with a 20 month old on our lap! Does anyone know if it's possible to change the infant ticket to an actual seat & pay the difference in KF miles? Alternatively, has anyone done such a long haul with a toddler on lap in business & willing to share tips/recommendations??

thanks again.